


give me your cold hands, put them on my heart

by escapismandsharpobjects



Category: Grimm (TV)
Genre: FebuWhump2021, Gen, Hostage Situations, Hurt/Comfort, Knives, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-18 04:55:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29728662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escapismandsharpobjects/pseuds/escapismandsharpobjects
Summary: febuwhump day 26: hostage situation (alt no.5).The knife presses a little harder into Nick’s throat. He feels blood well up along its edge, feels it slowly trickle down his neck and into the collar of his shirt. It stings a little, but in the grand scheme of things feels like nothing. It’s more the thought of what could so easilyhappenthat’s hurting him at the moment.
Relationships: Nick Burkhardt & Hank Griffin
Comments: 8
Kudos: 18





	give me your cold hands, put them on my heart

**Author's Note:**

> hi!! this is out Late tonight, sorry lol. i was having a lot to do this evening but despite that i actually had a really nice time writing this! hope you enjoy :)  
> title from afterlife by ingrid michaelson which has evidently become my nick and hank song lmao

It happens so quickly that even Nick’s lightning reflexes can’t help him. 

The man grabs him from behind, and Nick immediately tries to fight him off. But the guy evidently has more strength than him, because he contains Nick easily, despite his struggling. A single arm wraps around him, so tightly he struggles to breathe.

“Hank!”

Hank comes crashing through some trees, gun drawn. “Nick!”

The hand not currently trapping Nick is suddenly in his hair, yanking his head back and exposing his throat. It's met with the sharp edge of a knife, which is pressed lightly, threateningly, into the skin. 

He doesn’t dare try to talk to the man, or swallow, or even breathe, as he feels the knife cut ever so slowly into his throat.

“Give me your gun,” his captor says to Hank, “and your phone.”

_ Think about this, _ Nick thinks at Hank, since speaking is kind of off the table for the moment.  _ Do the smart thing. Even if it might mean I get hurt.  _

But Hank does the perhaps dumber thing and gives up his weapon and his phone, placing them slowly and carefully on the ground and kicking them over with his foot.

“Can I have my partner back now?”

The knife presses a little harder into Nick’s throat. He feels blood well up along its edge, feels it slowly trickle down his neck and into the collar of his shirt. It stings a little, but in the grand scheme of things feels like nothing. It’s more the thought of what could so easily  _ happen  _ that’s hurting him at the moment.

“Not yet,” the man says in response to Hank’s question. “I want cash. And a way out of here. And I want it  _ now. _ Or I just might have to kill your partner here.”

Nick watches as Hank slowly goes for his wallet, pushes it again towards the man’s feet. 

“I’ve got maybe $150 cash and a credit card in there,” he says. “Probably a few gift cards if you’re looking to stop by a Barnes and Noble.”

“What about him?” asks the man, wrapping his arm still tighter around Nick’s torso. 

“Nick, man, you got any cash on you?”

He does, although it’s not much. He doesn’t nod, however, or say  _ yes. _ Just looks at Hank and conveys his answer. Hank reads him easily. 

“He’s got some money, but not a lot, same as me. Can I get it for him?”

“Okay, but you just watch it. You try anything and I hurt him. More.”

“I’ll watch myself,” Hank promises, and then his hand is in Nick’s pocket, but not the one with his wallet in it. Nick feels Hank’s fingers find his phone, pressing the power button rapidly for an emergency call. It’s about to start ringing when the knife suddenly digs deeper into Nick’s throat, and he feels like if it goes much further there may not be any coming back. He makes a sort of choking sound as blood starts pouring from the wound more rapidly. 

“You stop that,” says his captor, “or the next cut I make might be the last.”

Hank’s hand leaves Nick’s pocket just as someone on the other end of the line says, “911, what’s your emergency?”

_ “Tell them it was a wrong number,” _ hisses the man, the metal of his knife still on Nick’s throat, though for now it’s stopped actively cutting into him. The wound, understandably, is hurting more now, and the blood has completely soaked the upper part of his shirt, making him start to shiver (though he has to admit that may be due to more than just the dampness of his shirt). 

“Uh, sorry. Wrong number,” Hank says. 

_ “Hang up.” _

Hank’s hand reaches back into Nick’s pocket and hangs up the call as the operator asks if they’re  _ really  _ sure they’re okay.

“His wallet, please.”

This time Hank’s hand goes to the right pocket, pulls out Nick’s wallet to set it at the man’s feet, around which is accumulating quite the pile of items. 

Maybe enough items that Hank can -

_ Clickboom. _

\- grab his gun and shoot the guy while setting down the wallet. 

His would-be murderer falls away from Nick, the knife  _ finally  _ sliding away from his throat, making a shallow cut as it drags without control over his skin. And then the man hits the ground, knife skittering out of his hand, which wraps around his upper leg instead, where Hank had managed to shoot him. 

“Nice...shot,” Nick says, bringing a hand to his throat when the speaking hurts. The hand comes away stained with blood, which isn’t really a surprise, but there’s so  _ much  _ of it, more than he’d really been expecting, and he can feel it smeared all down his neck and underneath his shirt and  _ on  _ his shirt and the cut itself stings in the cool air, but burns at the same time, and his hands are starting to shake as the adrenaline wears off, and it’s all a _ lot.  _ He looks instinctively to Hank for help. 

Hank’s in the middle of cuffing the suspect, but he finishes the job just as Nick is starting to slump forwards. He grabs Nick before he can fully collapse, his hands steady and calming on Nick’s slightly-panicked body. 

They sink to the ground, and Hank grabs his phone from near Nick’s feet as he pulls off his jacket and then his shirt, the latter of which he carefully presses to Nick’s bleeding gash. 

It hurts more to have something touching it, though, and just to make it worse, it feels kind of like he’s choking. Nick backs away from the shirt, tries to take in a deep breath but coughs instead, which  _ hurts.  _

“Hey, hey, don’t do that,” Hank says. “I know it’s not comfortable, but you need to let me do this. It’ll slow down the bleeding.”

Nick nods in understanding, the movement forcing a bit more blood from the wound. It’s better than speaking, though, anyway. The shirt comes back, and it still hurts, still feels like he’s choking, but he tries to focus on what Hank had said and the fact that Hank is here right now, and talking to someone on the phone who will come and help them. It’s enough to keep him from completely panicking, anyway. 

“Help’s coming,” Hank announces, hanging up his phone. “They’ll be here in about ten minutes. Luckily neither of you is in serious danger of bleeding out.” Nick catches him shooting a glare at the captor-turned-captive handcuffed next to them, whose bullet wound is sluggishly bleeding - incapacitating, but not lethal. Pretty excellent work, especially considering the circumstances, Nick thinks, returning his focus to Hank. 

“How are you doing?” Hank asks, adjusting his grip on the shirt pressed to Nick’s neck. 

Nick almost says,  _ you know, my hands are working fine, you don’t need to keep holding that, I can do it myself, _ but something (apart from the thought of the pain of speaking) stops him, lets him accept Hank’s care. 

“Okay,” he whispers, wincing as even that low volume hurts his throat. 

“Sorry,” Hank whispers back. “I’m not gonna make you talk anymore.”

_ Please keep talking to me, _ Nick thinks at him,  _ even if I don’t talk back. _ If Hank  _ doesn’t  _ keep talking, keep distracting him, then he’s going to start  _ really  _ thinking about what’s happened, which scares him a little more than he’d like to admit - especially admit to himself. 

“But just ‘cause  _ you  _ can’t talk doesn’t mean  _ I  _ can’t talk, so now you get to hear about  _ my  _ problems.”

Hank launches into a story about this new book he’s reading and all the cool stuff in it that he thinks Nick might like. It’s genuinely interesting stuff, and so distracting that Nick all but forgets about the feeling of the shirt pressing into his still-bleeding, hurting neck, forgets about the blood drying on his shirt and down his skin, forgets about the man sitting not three feet from him who did this to him…

Okay, maybe he’s not as distracted as he thought he was. He feels his breathing pick up, tries to calm it down before Hank notices, but Hank has his hand on Nick’s throat, so of course he’s going to notice.

“Nick, hey.  _ Breathe.” _

_ I’m trying,  _ Nick thinks. 

“I know you’re trying to breathe. Follow me, okay?” Hank reaches out with his unoccupied hand and grabs one of Nick’s lightly-trembling ones, guiding it to rest on his chest, over his heart. He takes a deep breath, in and out. 

Nick copies him as best as he can, throat burning with every jagged breath he takes.  _ This is stupid,  _ he thinks to himself.  _ I’ve been subjected to a lot worse than this. Why is this one thing affecting me so much? _

“Hey, breathe, remember?”

Nick focuses as much attention as he can on his hand that’s pressed to Hank’s chest. He feels it rise and fall with Hank’s breathing, and below that, feels his heart beating, steady and calm. He focuses on that, on the steady, sure rhythm of Hank’s heartbeat, letting his breathing slowly even out on its own. He feels his own heartbeat begin to slow in turn, feels the shaking in his body subside. 

“Feeling better?”

He nods into the fabric of Hank’s shirt, which is actually pretty soft and doesn’t aggravate his cut as much as he’d thought it would. 

“Good, because the paramedics are here.”

Nick looks up, where sure enough, a few paramedics are approaching. Two of them pay attention to Nick, while two others haul the other man away on a gurney.

They instruct Hank to move the shirt, then stick a clean gauze bandage to Nick’s throat for the journey to the ambulance. One of the paramedics begins to try and help Nick onto a second gurney, which he stubbornly refuses to do. He’s  _ fine. _ Certainly capable of walking, at any rate.

“He can walk,” Hank says for him, as Nick looks to him for assistance from the paramedic who is trying to convince him that it really is better if he just lets them do what they need to do.

“Are you sure?”

Hank raises an eyebrow at Nick for confirmation, which Nick quickly gives.

“It’s not like his legs are hurt. Just let him walk to the ambulance, and you can do what you need to do from there.”

The paramedic agrees, and the group walks to the ambulance, which is not all that far away, though it feels like miles. Nick supposes that’s the blood loss. But despite his slow, occasionally stumbling walking, Hank never tries to make him stop, or let anyone carry him, or do anything that he doesn’t want to do. He just wraps an arm around Nick’s shoulders to support him and keeps going.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading this!!!! hope you enjoyed (and sorry if it wasn't the best i am getting sleepy so my editing skills may have been wearing off lol). have a good night or whatever time of day you may be having!


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